Things to do in Wilmington NC this weekend April 27-30 – StarNewsOnline.com

It's on now.

After having a respectably full weekend roster of events in Wilmington for most of this year, the entertainment calendar has officially exploded. Big concerts at Live Oak Bank Pavilion and Greenfield Lake Amphitheater, for starters, plus smaller shows at the area's more intimate venues, breweries, bars and bottle shops.

In addition, all of the area's theatrical stages are full to bursting this week, and throw a very eventful April edition of the Fourth Friday Gallery Night art crawl on top of it all.

Read on for details on these and many other events happening in the Wilmington area this weekend.

ALL WEEKEND

At Thalian Hall's Ruth & Bucky Stein Studio Theatre: With Gen Z's well-documented and very necessary focus on mental health, right now is pretty much the perfect time for staging "Next to Normal," the Pulitzer-Prize-winning musical from 2010 about how one woman's struggle with repressed trauma impacts her entire family.

A rock musical about mental illness might not be the easiest sell, but this excellently staged show from Wilmington's BS Productions and Opera House Theatre Co. is a work of power, beauty and deep emotion that, under the direction of Cathy Street, expertly navigates the complex issues at hand (not to mention the complex vocal harmonies).

Heather Setzler turns in a strong performance as Diana, a woman who has perhaps lost herself as she tries to be a good wife to her relentlessly positive husband (Brent Schraff, excellent) and moody teenage kids (Leah Schraff and Maxwell Korn, both outstanding). An Act One rug pull sends the show into emotional overdrive, but the top-notch cast which includes J. Robert Raines as Diana's rock star doctor and Kellen Hanson as her daughter's caring boyfriend has the singing and acting chops to keep up.

It's essentially an intense family drama liberally salted with humor, with a new-musical style that isn't my personal favorite but which music director Chiaki Ito's band delivers with aplomb.

At times, the cozy studio theater struggles to contain the show's big sound, but Terry Collins' knockout set and Cole Marquis' warm, sometimes-dramatic lighting give the performers a strong visual backdrop. 7:30 p.m. April 27-29, 2 p.m. April 29-30. 910-632-2285.

At Brunswick Little Theatre: Nearly 80 years after making its debut and catapulting Tennessee Williams to fame, this sad but stirring 1944 drama still has the power to captivate.

The play is in good hands at Brunswick Little Theatre in Southport, where it runs through Sunday, with sensitive direction from Victor Gallo. A game cast is led by Carolyn Stringer in the larger-than-life role of Amanda Wingfield, matron of a fading, Depression-era St. Louis family whose fortunes are forever falling thanks to an anxiety-ridden adult daughter, Laura (Jamie Harwood), who can't face the world and a restless adult son, Tom (Josh Bailey), who just wants to escape.

Bailey gives Tom a sardonic world-weariness that's both appealing and tragic, Harwood brings a glittering fragility to the role of Laura and Steven Sullivan lets us see a little bit of the soul hiding beneath the salesmen-slick exterior of Jim, the "gentleman caller" Tom and Amanda finagle into their apartment to woo Laura.

As Amanda, Stringer hits high notes of hilarity on an arc toward sadness as we arrive at the play's devastating dnouement. An ending tweaked for maximum hopefulness isn't really warranted, but it's just the kind of baselessly positive spin that Amanda herself would probably approve of. 7:30 p.m. April 27 and 29, 3 p.m. April 29 and 30.

At DREAMS Center for Arts Education: Original play from Wilmington's Mouths of Babes Theatre Co. has been five years in the making. Built in part from newspaper reports of Wilmington's 1898 coup and massacre, interviews with locals on the legacy of 1898 are also woven into the play. Click here for a full review. 7:30 p.m. April 29 and 2 p.m. April 30.Tickets are $12-$15.

More: Wilmington theater 22 things to do in Wilmington this weekend: Your guide to can't-miss performances

At CFCC Wilson Center: Touring group brings its modern dance stylings to town as part of the Wilson Center's Move! performance series. Invertigo will perform "Formulae & Fairy Tales," a full-length work about World War II codebreaker Alan Turing that's ingeniously blended with the world of Turing's favorite film, Disneys "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs." 7:30 p.m. April 27 and 4:30 p.m. April 28, tickets are $25. 910-362-7999.

At CFCC Wilson Center: Wilmington's City Ballet presents this classic piece, a balletic comedy about a small-town wedding that's thrown into chaos when a mysterious young woman appears. With a score performed by a live orchestra. 7 p.m. April 29 and 3 p.m. April 30, tickets are $30. 910-362-7999.

At UNCW's Mainstage Theatre: The University of North Carolina Wilmington's Department of Theatre presents this dark comedy by Mac Wellman about a dystopian, environmentally ravaged world of the future. A student cast of 11 under the direction of Dr. Paul Castagno goes for a vibe that's at once humorous and unsettling.8 p.m. April 27-29, 2 p.m. April 30. Tickets are $6-$15. 910-962-3500.

At CFCC Wilson Center's studio theater: Cape Fear Community College's Department of Fine and Performing Arts presents this historical comedy by Jessica Swale about the women's education and suffrage movement. Set in 1890s England, the story follows a cohort of the first women to attend university in the UK, and their fight to be taken seriously.7 p.m. April 27-29, tickets are $15. 910-362-7999.

At Dead Crow Comedy Room: Edgy New York comic whose style has been described as dark and politically incorrect has an impressive comedy resume that she'll bring to downtown Wilmington's top comedy club. Iapalucci has been featured on late-night talk shows (including Letterman) and on Netflix, and she's got the coveted New Faces of Comedy card from Montreal's esteemed Just for Laughs festival in her pocket. 7 p.m. and 9:30 p.m. April 28-29, tickets are $18 and $28.

Thirteen-year-old Wilmington actress Elle Graham plays a prominent role in this new movie, out in theaters nationwide and based on the 1970 coming-of-age novel by Judy Blume. Elle plays Nancy Wheeler, the best friend of the title character portrayed by newcomer Abby Ryder Fortson.

More: Wilmington people Wilmington child star of stage and screen has big role in new Judy Blume movie

FRIDAY

Downtown Wilmington: It's a very eventful month for the April installment of this gallery crawl.

At Acme Art on North Fifth Avenue, it's a memorial retrospective exhibit to honor the beloved Wilmington artist Mio Reynolds, who died March 11 at the age of 84. A native of Japan, Reynolds moved to Wilmington in 2006 and quickly caught the eyes (and hearts) of local art fans with her paintings inspired by music, literature and, especially, by other people, who she captured in portraits.

Elsewhere at Fourth Friday this month, "Harmonic Dichotomy" will feature Agnes Preston Brame's figurative work and Katie Antonazzo's abstracts at New Elements Gallery on North Front Street, and the Burgwin-Wright House at Third and Market streets will highlight still lifes, landscapes, abstractions and more from Baltimore artist Greg Stanley. 6-9 p.m. April 28. For a full list of participating galleries, go to ArtsWilmington.org.

At Bourgie Nights: Two top-notch songwriters will be featured at this downtown venue. Durham's Randy Bickford, aka Scivic Rivers, has a warm, darkly honeyed voice and a style that recalls such '70s troubadours as James Taylor.

Sardone has been a part of the Wilmington music scene, off and on, for more than 30 years, and he's an inventive guitarist with the ability to traverse multiple genres, from heavy metal to rockabilly with all stops between. Sardone's latest tunes have something of an '80s pop-rock vibe, and he's got a new EP, "Colors," coming out in July from Wilmington's Fort Lowell Records. 9 p.m. doors, 10 p.m. show April 28, $10 in advance, $15 day of show.

At Greenfield Lake Amphitheater: Longtime Indiana jam band returns to Wilmington for a concert filled with epic improvisation, a blend of musical styles and a few inspired, reworked covers such at The Beatles' "I Want You (She's So Heavy)." 6:30 p.m. April 28, tickets start at $49.

At Jengo's Playhouse: This powerful documentary from Jackie Olive, who made the film while an artist in residence at Wilmington's Cucalorus Film Festival, takes on the mysterious case of Lennon Lacy, a Bladenboro teenager who was found dead, hanging from a swingset, in 2014. His death was ruled a suicide, but family members (and others) suspect Lennon was murdered. The film goes on to explore the psychic toll that the long history of lynchings in the South have taken on the Black community. "Always in Season" played the Sundance festival in 2019 and has screened on PBS. 7:30 p.m. April 28, $10.

SATURDAY

At Kenan Auditorium: Longtime American blues and rock bandbrings it Boogie Your Spring Away Tour to the UNCW campus. Little Feat celebrated the 50th anniversary of its founding in 2021 and is probably best known for its 1973 hit "Dixie Chicken." 8 p.m. April 29, tickets start at $61.50.

At Greenfield Lake Amphitheater: North Carolina songwriting legendand piano pounder Ben Folds has about a million clever, well-crafted songs, including "Brick," "Rockin' the Suburbs" and the entire "Over the Hedge" soundtrack. New single "Exhausting Lover" from upcoming New West album "All That Matters" is vintage Folds: lush, funny, endlessly tuneful and a little bit mean. 7 p.m. April 29, tickets are $51.

At Live Oak Bank Pavilion: Mega-popular country singer and songwriter known for such hits as "Fancy Like" and "AA" brings his crowd-pleasing tunes to Wilmington's biggest venue. 6:30 p.m. April 29, tickets start at $35.

At Reggie's 42nd Street Tavern: Semi-annual celebration to honor the life and work of late, legendary Wilmington musician Kevin "Casual Cuz" Davis of the rap-metal band N.U. Deep. Acts on the bill include The Cuz'ins and the Justin Cody Fox Band. 4 p.m. April 29, $10 at the door, cash only.

At Thalian Hall: Given the recent furor over Republicans attempting to ban drag performances in North Carolina and elsewhere, this one-man show from comedian Mike Delamont feels particularly timely. Delamont's touring show has the comic playing God, literally, as he offers various explanations for the Almighty's decisions. 7:30 p.m. April 29, 910-632-2285.

At Bourgie Nights: Chicago act plays a fiery brand of traditional bluegrass that's gotten them featured on stages around the world as part of a U.S. State Department "musical ambassadors" program. Upcoming album "Lead and Iron" features such gems as the quick-picked, exquisitely harmonized "Little Flower." 8 p.m. doors, 9 p.m. show, April 29. $15 in advance, $20 at the door.

SUNDAY

At Thalian Hall: Annual multi-day film festival celebrating Jewish culture, religion and identity continues this weekend. Sunday screenings are "Nora's Will" (1 p.m.), about a man forced to attend to the funeral of his ex-wife, and "Dedication" (4 p.m.), pianistRoger Peltzman's one-man show about how his family was forced to flee the Nazis in Europe, and how Peltzman attempts to channel the musical spirit of a relative who perished in a concentration camp. 1 p.m. and 4 p.m. April 30, 910-632-2285. Screenings continue May 1 and 3.

At Greenfield Lake Yacht Club: UPDATE: Due to expected bad weather, this event has been postponed to May 7. Grand opening for new bar and venue from the team behind downtown's manna and Bourgie Nights. A stacked musical lineup features some of Wilmington's best musicians and songwriters including Jared Michael Cline (2 p.m.), Sean Thomas Gerard (3 p.m.), Asia Daye (4 p.m.), Fred Flynn (5 p.m.), The Jewell Brothers (6 p.m.) and Jesse Stockton (7 p.m.). 2 p.m. April 30, free.

At Ogden Park: UPDATE: Food Truck Rodeo scheduled for Sunday, April 30, has been rescheduled to June 11 due to anticipated bad weather. Annual gathering of area food trucks will feature live tunes and tons of good eats. Get there and get fed. Noon-5 p.m., free.

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Things to do in Wilmington NC this weekend April 27-30 - StarNewsOnline.com